Thursday, December 7, 2017

Why Sandarbh?

We often get asked the question, "Why Sandarbh?"

Sandarbh is a word which is common to multiple Indian languages. In Sanskrit, it translates to the word - context.

So, before elaborating on that, we are going to tell you a story - about stories. Imagine that you are walking through the streets of Pondicherry, enjoying the wide streets lined with trees, the colourful buildings and the architecture. People are cycling around you, you can hear the ocean waves hitting the rocks, a beautiful story is being created. But imagine if the same streets are placed in Rajasthan desert. Would the story still be the same?

No architecture can be explained without it's context. You cannot talk about a beach house without explaining it's views,  the shopping mall does not have a story if it's placed in isolation.

Sandarbh is this story that revolves around architecture.

The Sandarbh of a building can be anything that influences it. It can be the street that it opens up to, it can be the features of the site or the location it is placed in. The socio- cultural environment of the surroundings of the building can form it's context. Or, like in Pondicherry's case - the heritage of the area can be the context.

A building's context can even be it's owner. Your childhood memory of the long French windows at your ancestral home,  the books that line up the shelves at your mother's house or the balcony where you sat and watched the stars at night. These memories converts into ideas which fuels architecture built for you.

And that, is precisely why Sandarbh

Tuesday, December 5, 2017

Return to blogging..

I have been intending to start blogging again for some time now, as I complete 20 years in this beautiful profession of architecture, Design and construction there is so much to talk about and share. So I feel strongly the desire to share some stories and experiences collected over a period of time. so the first post after a long time  is just a hi and a commitment to return to blogging....

Mathu bhai and Missile madam at Do Villa and Baara Maala

You realise how much is in a name when you are talking to one of our masons on site and they tell you that Mathu bhai has asked them to go t...